Do What You Love

Today I’m not talking about the weather. In fact, if I can avoid it, I’m not looking out the windows. Jon suggested that we leave the blinds closed so that we wouldn’t see the snow fall. But I like the light so the blinds are open but in my heart it is still fall in Minnesota despite the snow that covers everything in sight and continues to fall.

Instead of the weather, today I’m suggesting that you do what you love, whatever that is. For me, it’s photography, being in nature, and painting.

Do What You Love

I am enjoying my freesias (oh their sweet fragrance!) and chamomile flowers (such simple cheer). And I continue to come back to them again and again to photograph them.

Some of the freesia blossoms are beginning to wilt and their fragrance is more subtle today but still beautiful.

Each time I approach them I see something different and I adjust my camera and tripod to try to express the beauty that I feel and see.

Photograph what you love. Unapologetically. Do it all day long and poke anyone who tells you otherwise in the eye. 

There are few enough things in life that give us joy, that bring meaning to our days, that help us be more alive. And if what you love is bears and all you want to do is photograph them, know that your focus will have some very real advantages. Or it might if you’re paying attention. And if you want to photograph puppies and people and ponies and Paris and pomegranates on purple paper, then you’re my kind of weirdo and I love you to pieces. Although your photography might not remotely stir my heart, it’s clear that it stirs yours, and I will do whatever I can to give you more of that kind of joy, not less. And maybe, in a way, you’re specializing in your own thing, I don’t know. But I know this: the thing photographed not with indifference but with love—the thing we truly give a damn about, whether it’s only ever bears or everything you can find that starts with the letter “p”—those photographs and the act of making them will mean something important to you.  

…

Photograph something you love in a way that gives you joy, or challenges you, or wakes you up to how amazing life can be, because if you don’t feel it, not only will no one else feel it, but what’s the point?

   — David duChemin, The Contact Sheet / October 18, 2020

Seek out joy frequently

Photographing flowers brings me joy. Every time I do it. If you were to look at my dining room “studio” on the buffet you might miss the beauty. Flowers are spread haphazardly across three different vases and a tall drinking glass. And if you look from a distance it looks like a mess. But when you get up close, really close, you can see the individual uniqueness and beauty of every single blossom. Try it sometime. Focus in closely on an object from nature. Notice it’s texture, color, scent, and the way that light bounces off of it.

To be able to see, smell, touch, hear, and feel beauty is a gift. I don’t ask why that flowers bring me such joy. But I feel gratitude that something so simple and attainable can brighten my days. Flowers may not be your route to joy. But it you pay attention and notice what lights you up, you too, can make joy a regular part of your life.

If photography isn’t your thing, maybe sketching or painting is. Or perhaps you’re a writer or crafts-person. Anytime you focus on doing what you love you have the opportunity to be present. Time stretches or disappears in this state.

I hope that you do what you love today.

May you walk in beauty.

I noticed the leaves I had been playing with in watercolor painting on the plastic tablecloth and they reminded me of flowers